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New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand has just finished one campaign for the U.S. Senate and it’s time to start another.

The Capital Region Democrat won a Nov. 2 special election to fill the remaining two years of now-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s six-year term by a wide margin. But already, she’s being forced to gear up for yet another campaign in 2012, when she’ll try to win a full term in the Senate.

Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y. (AP Photo/Drew Angerer)

While Gillibrand is not among the most endangered incumbents in the upcoming election cycle, her race is emblematic of the tough slog Democrats — who now hold a lead of 51-47, with two Independents who caucus with them — are facing.

Twenty thre of the 33 seats up for grabs in 2012 are held by Democrats. Seventeen of the 23 Democrats, including Gillibrand, represent states where Republicans captured Democratic House seats in the 2010 midterms.

But one twist to the election process will cause Cornyn headaches: At least four incumbent Republican senators &#151 Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas, Orrin Hatch of Utah, Olympia Snowe of Maine and Richard Lugar of Indiana &#151 are likely to draw Tea Party challengers if they run for re-election. So the Texas conservative already is bracing for more complaining from the right that he’s siding with establishment Republicans.

Remember that the winds shift quickly in American politics, and an incumbent’s political strength 24 months before the election is not a guarantee of the final result. (Just look at recently defeated Wisconsin Democrat Russ Feingold, who the pundit elite had declared a shoo-in a year before the three-term senator was booted out.)

With that warning, here is our list of 12 incumbents who could be vulnerable in 2012:

Meredith McDermott/Hearst Newspapers

Sen. Joe Lieberman

Joe Lieberman, I-Conn.

The Democrat-turned-Independent is in a difficult place. His approval rating stood at 33 percent in the most recent Public Policy Polling survey. Elected four years with overwhelming support of Republicans, he’s likely to face a strong Republican contender next time around, as well as a partisan Democrat eager to reclaim the seat. “Lieberman has now reached the point where neither Democrats nor Republicans are particularly inclined to re-elect him,” says PPP’s Tom Jensen. Political junkies’ dream match-up: Independent Lieberman vs. Republican wrestling executive Linda McMahon (fresh off a 2010 Senate defeat) and Democrat Ted Kennedy Jr.

Ben Nelson, D-Neb.
Nelson is the last Democrat standing in heavily Republican Nebraska. Every other Cornhusker State rep in DC is a Republican, and there are lots of popular, well-financed Republicans lining up for a chance to run against the center-right Democrat vilified on Fox News and conservative talk radio for the so-called “Cornhusker Kickback” &#151 the political payoff he won before voting for the Democratic health-reform plan.

John Ensign, R-Nev.
This family-values (former) favorite of the Religious Right had an affair with a staffer’s wife, paid money to the couple and then fired the husband after the affair ended. Sounds like a career killer, right? Oh, we almost forgot: Louisiana Sen. David Vitter won a landslide victory this year after being implicated in the Washington Madam sex scandal. Who knows? Most Nevada voters despised their other senator, Harry Reid, and yet they sent him back to DC. Ensign, the scion of a gambling empire, is prepared to roll the dice.

AP photo

Sen. Jim Webb

Jim Webb, D-Va.
Because of the now-infamous “Macaca Moment,” Democrat Jim Webb became a senator and Republican Sen. George Allen became a case study in the dangers of YouTube. Allen’s 2008 presidential ambitions were dashed, but he’s mulling a rematch. Virginia tossed out three of its six Democratic congressmen this year and Webb could face extinction if President Obama doesn’t regain lost popularity in a state he carried four years ago.

Claire McCaskill, D-Mo.
Another narrow winner from 2006, McCaskill’s approval rate stood at 40 percent in a recent poll, while 53 percent of Missourians gave her negative reviews. That’s not so great in a state where a Republican Washington insider rolled to an easy Senate win this anti-Washington year over a highly touted made-in-Missouri Democrat.

>>> On the jump page: Olympia Snowe, Orrin Hatch, Scott Brown, Debbie Stabenow and more.Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio
Brown ousted incumbent Republican Mike DeWine in a 2006 landslide amid a state economic depression. Ohio is still in the abyss. This year, it kicked out the Democratic governor elected on the ticket with Brown. Two years hence, this plain-talking populist will have a major challenge in a state where Republicans swept every statewide office in 2010.

Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich.
Another Democrat in a state that swung hard right in 2010. Stabenow, a very partisan Democrat, has a large bloc of irreconcilable critics. But she’s a fighter and is preparing for a costly battle for the hearts of working-class independents.

Meredith McDermott/ Hearst Newspapers

Sen. Scott Brown

Scott Brown, R-Mass.
Ted Kennedy’s successor might get the opportunity to run against Ted Kennedy’s widow in 2012. If Victoria Kennedy decides to challenge Republican Sen. Scott Brown, she’d have serious star power. If she doesn’t do it, Brown, who’s become a star in his own right, would probably become the favorite &#151 even in heavily Democratic Massachusetts.

Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas
Democrats will have an uphill time capturing this seat held by the Dallas Republican since 1993, despite a strong contender in former Texas Comptroller John Sharp. But Hutchison, if she chooses to run for fourth full term, is very vulnerable to a challenge from the right. A Rasmussen Reports poll found that just one in three Republicans said they’d vote to renominate her in 2012.

Olympia Snowe, R-Maine
Polls show that the veteran moderate is the most popular senator up for re-election in 2012 and is a favorite of her state’s large independent voting bloc. So why should she be on a watch list? The reason is simple: the Tea Party. Maine recently elected a Tea Party Republican as its governor, and Snowe has to watch out for a primary challenge from the right. Just ask popular centrist Republican Mike Castle of Delaware.

Jon Tester, D-Mont.
Tester narrowly defeated a Republican incumbent six years ago in a very Democratic year. But the political climate has changed and there are two A-List Republicans who would be tough foes: Rep. Denny Rehberg and former Gov. Marc Racicot. Already, Tester, a former farmer who returns home every weekend, has drawn a wealthy Republican opponent in Bozeman tech executive Steve Daines. “Jon Tester is a good man, he is a decent person and a good guy,” Daines said this week. That’s before he lit into him as an Obama lackey with an extreme liberal record. Whew!

Orrin Hatch, R-Utah
This seat is not going Democratic, but it could go Tea Party. Just like this year, when Hatch’s Senate partner, Bob Bennett, was denied renomination by Tea Party-backed Mike Lee. Hatch, like Bennett, is a longtime incumbent who &#151 horror of horrors &#151 has a long track record of working with Democrats on legislation. He even spoke at Ted Kennedy’s funeral. His likely challenger is a conservative young gun, Rep. Jason Chaffetz. Hatch says he’s more conservative and tougher than Bennett. He’ll need a hard shell and some hard sell to repel Utah’s powerful Team Tea

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Rick Dunham of the Houston Chronicle is a leading expert on journalists' use of social media and niche web sites. He created Texas on the Potomac in 2007. He also is the president of the National Press Club Journalism Institute, the educational and charitable arm of the world's leading professional organization for journalists.

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